Dutch Dividend Engineer

Reviewing my 2017 Goals

I’ve been thinking about my new goals for 2018. Before doing so, though, I’d like to review my 2017 goals.

2017 has been the third complete year as a DGI. And what a year it was. The value of my Vrijheid Fonds has grown. The value of my Vrijheid Fonds at January 1st, 2017 was € 79,158 and at the end 2017 the total value was € 90,894. With a donation of € 7,139 of fresh capital I made a really nice yield.

Return in 2017

My return for my Vrijheid Fonds in 2017 was 5.26% ((90,894 / (79,158 + 7,139) – 1). And if I compare my return with the return of some major indices, you can see that my Vrijheid Fonds didn’t beat the indices this year. But I’m proud of a return of 5.26%, this is way higher than I can get on my savingsaccount.

For 2017, I’ve set five different goals. In 2017 it was (again) hard to find the time to write a post. I find it more and more difficult to balance my time between family, work, sport, books and Polliesdividend. But I enjoyed every second of it. It was also educational, because English is not my native language. During this year I learned new words and proverbs.

In the beginning of 2017 I had an average views per day of around 60 for my. At the end the average views per day have grown to around 86 a day. An increase of more than 40% and I’m proud of it!

And I’m grateful of al the comments visitors wrote on my site. Thank you for it! I really appreciated it!

Goals 2017

Increase Dividend Income to € 3,100 in 2017-AlmostAchieved!

In 2017 I received € 3,081.16 in dividend income. This is my dividend income after taxes. And as you can see I almost reached my first goal.

My dividend income for 2017 showed an increase of more than 0.06% from previous year, this is including the super dividend from Ahold I received in 2016. To compare my passive income from 2017 with 2016, I have to remove this super dividend from the equation. And then I have an increase 21,23%

I’m proud of this very nice increase! It is a great starting position for 2018. I hope I can keep this kind of increases for the next couple of years! 😉

Save more than 40% of my net income in 2017, averaged monthly – Achieved!

In 2017 I saved a little bit more than 40% on average of my income. So yes I achieved this goal!

The extra saving has not all been used for investing. We have been saving for some home improvement. And I have raised the value of my emergency fund (savings account).

Invest a total of € 7,000 new cash –Achieved!

In order to let my Vrijheid Fonds grow, it needs fresh cash. My ultimate goal is to live of my dividend Income. Therefore my Vrijheid Fonds needs to grow.

I donated a total of € 7,139 of fresh capital, and I’m proud of!

Write a least 100 post on Polliesdividend –Failed!

In 2017 I wrote 71 blog posts.

As you know, I enjoy writing blog post. And yes I still find it hard to write a post, because English is not my native language. Therefore it takes a little bit more time to write a post. And furthermore I (mr perfect) want it to be perfect. But writing my investing decisions down helps me to make better decisions. And it also helps me to track my progress. Another motivation is to network more actively with other investors focused on dividend growth investing. The wider audience and increased traffic to Polliesdividend is a welcome bonus.

As already mentioned, I find it more and more difficult to balance my time between family, work, sport, books and Polliesdividend. That’s why I haven’t reached this goal. This is the second year in a row that I wasn’t able to write 100 posts on Polliesdividend. Therefore I really have to rethink about this kind of goal.

Keep investing in my self by following a webinar or read two books every quarter –Achieved!

Stephen Covey called it Sharpen the Saw. I think it is important to keep education your self. And of course maintain good health.

For my physical sharpening I have been going to the gym twice a week (on average) .

For my mental sharpening I followed four webinars

Taxes and investing in The Netherlands.

Dutch pension system, but then fun.

Sustainability in the ABP – Portfolio (ABP is my corporate Pension fund, the 5th biggest pension fund in the world)

Dividend investing – from the magazine Beleggers Belangen.

Furthermore I read four books, of which 3 about investing. On all these investing books I wrote a review.

I’m proud to say I achieved this goal!

Conclusion

So I’m happy to report that I’ve reached three out of five goals and one almost.

In my letter to my readers – Year review I will go deeper into certain goals and aspects of what happened in 2017.

Now I’ve done my review of 2017, it is time to set new goals for 2018.

Thanks for reading. Did you reached your 2017 goals? If you didn’t set goals, are you planning on setting goals for 2018? Any feedback is greatly appreciated!

4 thoughts on “Reviewing my 2017 Goals”

Congrats! For a moment I was (shocked) wondering what you meant by yield. A yield of 5.26% would definitely beat all the indexes (except for probably REIT index). Your next graph was more indicative … I realized you were talking about returns :-).

I included my dividend payments in my return calculation. Because all the dividend is selectively reinvested, they are all included in my calculation.
I calculate my return (%) by (value Vrijheid Fonds end 2017/ (value Vrijheid Fonds begin 2017 + the sum of all cash donations in 2017) -1).
The value of my Vrijheid Fonds is the combined value of all my stocks and remaining cash.

Pollie

I’m a 40-something old guy from The Netherlands, aka Pollie.
I have a family with two little kids, a day job, a house with a garden and this blog to keep me busy. So not much different from you; an investor with a busy life with limited time to trade.
I want to share my journey to hopefully inspire others and also to track my progress towards my ultimate goal of financial independence.
Pollie@polliesdividend.com